Words that hurt us (and words that save us)
by SaturnXK
Summary: Bertholdt chases words, and Annie holds them close to her heart. – Bertholdt/Annie. letter writer!au.


late-ass christmas present, cloud piece. this is for you. or maybe call it an early new year's gift. and wow idk what i did to annie and bertholdt's characters so don't kill me pls.

it's sort of au, but like not. i don't particularly know where this is set, just that it's not in snk-verse. and it's most likely not in the 21st century either. probably not even the 20th century. or the 19th. well it might be the 19th. idk.

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"Words mean more than what is set down on paper. It takes the human voice to infuse them with shades of deeper meaning." – Maya Angelou, _I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings_

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It is mid-December, white and snowy and misty, and the tips of his fingers are small flutters of fire as he carves each word delicately into the page.

"Tell him… tell him to stay safe."

_Stay safe; I worry about you a lot._

"And eat."

_Make sure you eat healthily._

"And tell him… tell him that I love him."

_I love you. I love you very much._

"That's all."

_May Lady Luck be with you,_

_Hannah._

Carefully, he scatters sand across the page and lays the quill to the side, nodding once as Hannah hands over the money.

"For my fiancé, Franz," Hannah whispers. There is a small, rosy smile on her lips, a bright glow in her eyes. She carries herself as if she is stepping on clouds, shoulders thrown back and head held high. She is happy, carrying her own miniature sun inside her chest, and Bertholdt wants to shield his eyes because it is almost overwhelming.

He rolls the letter up and seals it.

"Have a nice day," Bertholdt murmurs, and she sweeps off in a flourish of silk.

The room is silent when Hannah is gone; she takes her sun with her and leaves him in darkness, icy and silent.

He lives in the worlds of his speakers. When they disappear, he crashes back to reality where he sits waiting for the next one to arrive. In a way, letter writing is his drug, his ticket away from the dusty sighs of his little wooden room in the corner of Palmer Street and Wisteria Avenue.

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He's closing shop for the day, dragging weary limbs as he pulls the curtains and checks the lock of his back door and makes sure his parchments are stacked neatly and then the bell tinkles and Bertholdt doesn't know whether or not he's happy that he has another customer because he sorely needs the money (and he sorely needs the escape).

He looks up to say _welcome, you're the last one for today_, and he's met with a face that simultaneously launches a thousand ships and builds an empire in his heart.

"Good evening, letter-writer," the woman says. She has a soft voice that fluidly runs over him like perfumed oil. She stands like a queen and speaks like the wind, and yet he's never seen anyone more grounded than her. Her eyes are frozen chunks of ice with the sky reflected in them, hair like woven gold and held up with a net of white and red.

"Ma'am," Bertholdt responds, ducking his head. It is clear that she is of the upper-class. "What can I do for you today?"

"I wish to send a letter," said the woman, "in the name of Annie Leonhart."

"Of course," Bertholdt says. He gestures to the chair opposite his desk. "Please sit down, Miss Leonhart."

Annie glances at the name plaque and nods. "Thank you, Mr Hoover."

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_Dear Reiner,_

_I miss you. I love you. I hope you would come home soon._

_Annie Leonhart._

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"Is that all for today?"

"Yes."

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Bertholdt has written letters great and small. He's written letters that go on for pages and pages and pages, and written letters that only has three words inked in. But never has he written one that is so blunt and forceful, such as Annie Leonhart's.

How very simple the letter was. How very uncomplicated the characters were. But as Bertholdt penned them down, black against white in a world of greys and browns, something juts painfully in his heart, as if a spear dipped in poison has nicked him.

Bertholdt is a letter-writer who lives in the worlds of his speakers. He creates stories in his head, and he has created enough that it does not take him very long to discern what has pained him.

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It is one quiet Sunday afternoon and the sun settles among the clouds, casting his eyes in splashes of bright, searing light amongst the twinkling snow. A pipe rests in his left hand, and in his right he gently rubs circles into the worn timber of his table.

He falls asleep to the image of eyes like twin pools of sapphire and hair like sunshine.

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She arrives the next day, his last customer, and she sits opposite him and holds him steady with her gaze.

He writes the same thing he has always written. All fifty-six times she has been here.

Part of him wonders when she'd give up. Fifty-six times, now fifty-seven, and _Reiner, he's a man I love very much _has not yet once replied.

He wants to ask, so he does. But he twists the question slightly, and perhaps it is crueler this way.

"Does he love you back?" Bertholdt asks.

Annie's eyes flicker to his face, bold and blue. She doesn't reply.

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–_and the officials have declared our home an unsafe zone. We must leave, and I shamefully beg you, dear friend of mine, to house my family, if only for a few days while we make sense of this mess. We have–_

The front door of the letter-writer's office slams open. Bertholdt and his client Connie look up, startled, at the panicked frame of a noble lady, chest heaving and plush lips trembling.

Her iron fingers are laced together; on her face was an expression that was filled with a hurt so raw it was almost animalistic.

"He replied," is all she manages.

"Why did you come here?" And he wants to take back the words because they are insensitive and he should have asked _are you okay?_

Connie is polite. He understands, despite the urgency of his own situation. He says he'll come back later. Bertholdt reminds himself to give Connie a lesser price the next time he is here.

It turns out that when Annie said that _he replied_, it wasn't in the traditional sense. Reiner had given his answer to her love in the form of an act.

"He was kissing the richer, prettier daughter of one of the generals'," Annie chokes. Her voice is an empty well that echoes with betrayal and the waters of agony. Bertholdt doesn't know what to do, so he simply lays a hand atop hers.

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Words are precious. Words convey so many emotions. Words are what people turn to when distance is too much and time is of the essence. Words survive falls of civilisations and the shredding of history. But words are words are words are limited, and one million words can never describe the beauty or sadness that is Annie Leonhart.

Annie is so contradictory. She is a thousand brilliant sunrises, and also the deepest slice of the night. Her loyalty shackles her to the ground, but she is selfishly lonesome, and she takes flight with nobody but herself. Annie is a lord's daughter, but spends too much of her day in the downtown area, by Bertholdt's side.

Bertholdt is an observer. He sees.

"Perhaps," Annie muses one day, "I was never in love with Reiner to begin with."

Bertholdt never looks up from his work. "Is that so?"

"You don't sound very surprised."

"That's because I'm not."

There is a tiny, hollow chuckle that sags with despair and relief and resignation. Bertholdt's fingers still.

"I expect that you, as a letter-writer who chases words all day long, can differentiate between the real and unreal, am I wrong?"

_You're wrong._

But Annie is desperate, and Bertholdt refuses to look up because he can imagine Annie's expression perfectly in his mind right now. Lost and confused and distressed, because what is she supposed to do now when she has spent two years pining after a man with whom she wasn't even in love with? "Were my words false, Mr Hoover? Am I just a fool?"

He sets his quill down, and raises his eyes. Again, Annie's beauty hits him like a fleeing horse, and he takes a few moments to recover.

"No, your words were never false, Miss Leonhart," Bertholdt says steadily. "They were just directed at the wrong person."

She swallows and her fingers shake like the trembles of a quivering mouse. In one effortless movement, Bertholdt stands and crosses his tiny wooden room and crouches down and holds her gaze.

"Heartache is painful, but such is the course of love," Bertholdt says. "And I know that all too well."

Annie blinks slowly, and then moves away from him in three steps that leaves his heart beating a dead rhythm.

"Love is not complicated," Annie says quietly. Her voice is smoke, furling away softly in the still air. "When you love, you love, it's as simple as that. Romance, however, is very intricate. Romance is when you jump off a cliff, when you leave for the other side of the world, when you uproot your entire life, when you tear your heart to shreds and set alight the bleeding pieces, all in the name of love. That is romance: complex and difficult and exaggerated. Love is simple; an emotion that comes too easily and leaves with snapping jaws and digging heels, but in the end is just a beautiful, terrible feeling that settles in your chest and consumes your entire being."

Bertholdt says nothing when Annie expects him to say something. She leaves.

For a man who spends his whole life documenting every emotion under the sun, whose flesh is made of phrases and longing and happiness and hate, whose very bones are filled with the worlds of those around him, he is speechless at the most inconvenient of times. Annie has that effect on him, and Bertholdt spends the rest of the day cursing his stupidity.

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Annie doesn't return, and Bertholdt continues to write.

"Tell him to stay safe."

_Stay safe._

"And eat."

_Eat._

"And tell him I love him."

Bertholdt pauses, quill quivering just above the parchment.

_Signed,_

_Mina Carolina_

Mina Carolina takes the letter with a smile and hands him the money.

"They say you're the best letter-writer around," Mina says cheerfully. "And that you have a way with words, that you can interpret the stuttering and mumblings of the speaker and discern their true meaning."

Bertholdt freezes. "Is that what they say?"

"Yes! That's why I'm happy to be your customer. Thank you, Mr Hoover."

Bertholdt bows as she dances out the door like a drifting flower, exactly like Annie but not. He almost doesn't straighten up because his head is spinning from guilt and his muscles are weakening and _god, I miss her_ _so much._

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Bertholdt is good at what he does because he _lives_ it. He lives in the characters, in each swirl and curve and press into the parchment and in the scents of old, papery pages. In a way, Bertholdt supposes that that doesn't exactly count as living. Not really. Not like everyone else. He is lost in his letters, spends his waking hours wandering in fantasy worlds of politics and longing and crisp, brisk statements and invitations and hate.

But Annie isn't a letter. She isn't the feathery quill or the lumpy parchment or the glistening, dark-as-night ink.

Bertholdt stands abruptly and strides over to the entrance, one step at a time, further and further away from his letters, and he steps out and into the monotonous rain and even though it's sad and dreary, he feels his blood moving again for the first time in what feels like an eternity.

And then he slams into something soft and bangs his chin on something that feels as hard as a rock.

"Ouch," mutters a voice that is familiar and wonderful and low. "Mr Hoover! I am so sorry! Here, let me help you–"

And Bertholdt allows himself to be checked over, slack-jawed because Annie is standing right in front of him and he hasn't seen her for three weeks and right now he should be the one asking if she's alright, but she's so beautiful that his throat has closed up and he can't say a word.

"I-I'm fine, Miss Leonhart," Bertholdt finally says, gently pushing her away. "Thank you."

Annie steps back, flustered. "My apologies. I just–well I was in a hurry, because I need a letter written and–"

It happens at the front of his store, standing at his door with rain pouring and the wind crying and a chill that fingers through their clothes.

He's been living in a daydream, in flat landscapes and black and white words.

–_I regret to inform you that the honourable Colonel Erwin Smith has died in the Battle of Trost–_

–_Father has been well, and Mother is getting along finely. Her sickness has passed–_

–_must beware, as the King is intending to suggest a trade route along our country. Refuse, for it would ruin us–_

But as he presses his lips gently onto Annie's, as his hand curls around her waist and tugs her closer, as her eyes flutter shut and his does the same, he feels a fire that burns within his chest, and he has never felt more alive than now.

It is time for him to wake up. It is time for him to live, with Annie by his side.

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wow omg do you guys know how long i've spent agonizing over the ending? like three days or some shit because i was just WHAT DO I DOOOOOOOOO?!

yeah i know bert and annie aren't even in the same class but whatevs they get together ehurhurhur.

this is probs my last fic for 2013. and idk why or how or when 2014 arrived, like seriously. i'm still stuck in 2012 for crying out loud. don't do this to me D;

happy early new year, my special muffins. i hope you prance your way sassily into 2014.


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